


A Conversation At War

by WattStalf



Series: Two Straight Dads [6]
Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Gen, Side Story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2016-07-19
Packaged: 2018-07-25 11:01:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7530118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WattStalf/pseuds/WattStalf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Side story to Growing Up.</p><p>Eddie and Jon have a discussion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Conversation At War

**Author's Note:**

> The outline for this was just: "a conversation is had at war. It's awkward but, hey, nobody dies this time."  
> Takes place during chapter 4.

It was awkward as hell, going to war with your daughter's boyfriend. Throw in the fact that said daughter kind of hated you and moved out to live with him without even saying goodbye because of how much she hated you, and it moved a little beyond 'awkward as hell', and that was only the half of it. When the boyfriend was goddamn Dr. Manhattan and probably not even a fucking human anymore, and when he had the personality of a brick wall and that constant vacant look in his eyes, when he had essentially been shipped out here because _you_ weren't enough of a hero to handle things...yeah, Eddie could go on for hours about how fucking weird all of this was.

But he'd been doing his best to be a good sport about it, and avoid the blue freak as often as possible, and whenever they were forced to spend time together, he pretended like he didn't know that this guy had... _intimate_ knowledge of the daughter that Eddie had barely spoken to in nearly two years. He thought he was doing a pretty good job of it, too, but it was hard to tell what Manhattan was thinking at any given time.

Whatever the case, he kept his distance pretty well until the day of their victory. That night, there was a lot of celebration in the streets, but Eddie couldn't say he really gave a damn. It wasn't as if anyone had really won the war except for Dr. Manhattan himself, and if the other soldiers wanted to celebrate a victory that they had no chance of achieving on their own, they could do that without him. He preferred to spend the night in a dingy bar, getting shitfaced and wondering what awaited him at home.

And that plan went rather well until Manhattan decided to phase through the fucking wall and stand next to Eddie's bar stool, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. He just  _stood there_ , not doing or saying anything, and Eddie could only ignore him for so long before he said, “What? Got somethin' to say?”

“I wanted to see how you chose to celebrate,” he replied, his voice without tone. “If you would prefer I go somewhere else...”

“Nah, I don't give a shit,” he lied. “Do whatever ya wanna do.” There was a long stretch of silence, and Eddie felt like he was being dissected even though all Manhattan was doing was standing around.

“You don't really seem to be celebrating,” he observed, and Eddie had to hold back the _no shit_ that rested on his tongue.

“I'll celebrate when I get home.”

“You plan to try to visit Laurie when you get home.”

Flinching, he wondered if that was more of his future bullshit, or if he was just making a guess. “If she'll see me.”

“She isn't as upset with you as she used to be,” replied Manhattan.

“I know _that_ ,” he snapped. “Still doesn't make it easy to talk to her. I mean, shit...” He had to be more drunk than he thought, to start talking about his feelings like this with one of his absolute least favorite people. “If she'd just _listen_ to me...”

“The things she learned about you concerning her mother were quite upsetting.”

“She doesn't...it wasn't...it's more complicated than she understands! I mean, I _admit_ that I did some fucked up shit, right? I was a stupid kid, and I did somethin' that I never shoulda...never shoulda even _thought_ about. An' Sal...Sal didn't deserve that shit, okay? I _realize_ that.” He shook his head, knowing that this was not the sort of conversation he should be having with anyone, much less Dr. Manhattan, but there were so many things he'd wanted to say to Laurie, and this was the closest he could get. He might have laughed at that, but he didn't feel like laughing.

“I loved her, ya know? All these years without her and I _still_ love her, an' I just wanted to do right by Laurie for her, but...Christ, I don't really know what I'm supposed to do now. She's never gonna look at me the same way again, and she's always gonna know...all that.”

“She might not always think of you so negatively,” Manhattan said after an unnaturally long stretch of silence.

“What?” Eddie snorted. “Doncha wanna look into the future or whatever? Then you can just _tell_ me how much she always hates me.”

“I can only see my own future, and I don't interact with both of you at the same time at any point. Besides,” he said, “most people seem to think they're better off not knowing. Laurie always hates when I talk about those sorts of things.”

He wondered what exactly that meant, that he wouldn't be around both of them at the same time. Did that mean he and Laurie were only going to get distant again, or was it just coincidence that she didn't have her boyfriend around whenever she saw him? Or could it mean something else? All of this was confusing enough to give him a headache when he was _sober_ , he certainly didn't want to look into it right now.

“Yeah, whatever,” he said with a snort. “Don't need you tellin' me shit either way.” The more he tried to think about things, the more he remembered the past and the more he imagined his future, the more uncomfortable he grew, and he was increasingly more aware of the silent presence of the man who had not taken his daughter away from him, but was easier to blame than himself.

Anger had always been easier for him to process than any other emotion, and he settled on that, thinking about how much he truly hated Dr. Manhattan, until he did not feel anything else. Finally, he stood up abruptly, muttering that he had more important shit to do, and stormed off with no destination in mind. He just wanted to empty his mind and stop thinking for a goddamn minute, to not have to miss Sally or wonder what she would think of him now, or think about how Laurie must hate him, how how he probably never would have been a part of Laurie's life at all, were Sally still alive.

He wondered how different his life would be at this point, if he'd never been able to raise his daughter, if he and Hollis hadn't been forced to get along for so long, if he had really been on his own. But thinking about that wasn't just confusing, it was depressing as hell, and tonight was supposed to be a happy one. It was their victory, goddammit!

Maybe Manhattan had a point about him not celebrating, and maybe spending some time with the other soldiers would do him some good after all. It wasn't like he had anything else to do, after all, and sitting alone in a bar hadn't done much good so far.

 


End file.
